Feb 27, 2017

The one surprise from the Mobile World Congress: 5G

There may have been drama at the Oscars on Sunday, but things in Barcelona went pretty much as expected as the global cell phone industry gathered for Mobile World Congress.

The new goodies: Samsung introduced a pair of tablets, LG debuted its latest flagship, the G6, while China's Huawei introduced a high-end model with dual Leica-branded 20-megapixel cameras.
The retro thing: There were new BlackBerry and Nokia phones, though BlackBerry isn't making the BlackBerry KeyOne, nor is Nokia making the Android phones that bear its name. Both are licensing deals.
5G ahead of schedule: One surprise out of Barcelona was an announcement from about 20 industry players that cell phones running the next generation of cellular technology, known as 5G, could arrive by 2019. It had been expected to take until 2020. AT&T and Verizon plan to test early 5G technologies starting this year, but not for cell phones.

What's next: While most of the big press conferences were on Sunday, Mobile World Congress officially starts Monday, so expect cell phone news to dribble out for most of this week.

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